Hate and Mayhem in Las Vegas
by Isabela Puccini
Summary: Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas MarySue is not implied. Josie Rowe is an average journalist who thanks to luck and druginduced impulses gets taken along as the apprentice to Raoul Duke to cover a boxing match in Las Vegas.
1. The Pickup

Disclaimer: I own Josie Rowe and this cup of coffee. That's about it though. No, I don't own Fear and Loathing, Hunter S. Thompson, or his work.

Dedication 1: Firstly and most importantly, I deem this here bit of cyberspace a dedication to the real Doctor, Hunter S. Thompson. The world's a lot sadder without him.

Dedication 2: This fic is also fondly co-dedicated to the rude reviewers of American Beauty. Thanks for nothing, dooshbags. :sticks out tongue:

A/N: Um... I talk too much. Here's the story...

* * *

"Hate and Mayhem in Las Vegas"

_After the company logos roll, the picture opens with nothing but a black screen. Then, the chatter of a large group of people can be heard growing more and more audible. We can just make out the tone of a certain Gonzo journalist and a woman's voice over all the others. The woman laughs, a laugh that quickly turns into a petrified scream followed by the terrible squeal of tires on road. And then suddenly the blackness of the screen is broken with-_

I was sitting next to the Great Man himself as we accelerated straight out of the convention center's parking lot and onto the main road. My heart raced in my chest with the force of some Native American war drum.

"What the hell are you doing?" I yelled, my voice high and panicked. "What the fuck do you think you're doing?"

The notepad and pen I had been jotting quotes down on had escaped out of the corvette and into the wind. The tape recorder clamped in my sweat-drenched hand was bouncing up and down with all the severe bumps and potholes we sped over in the street.

Up until this moment, Duke –as he liked to be called- had been giving an odd kind of soliloquy compiled around lots of "uhs" and "ums," until, at last words finally seemed to have channeled their way to his mouth.

"Hm? What? Oh. Yeah. Well, you wanted an interview, didn't you?" He said, more to the road than me.

_Freeze frame on a shot of DUKE and CUT TO:_

The constant madness of the place was getting to me. Everywhere I turned there was either a lung cancer charity stand or a woman selling German sugared pecans. It was too much. I was beginning to get, the Fear.

"Mr. Thompson, sir?" Called out an eager-faced teenager from my left. He was smiling like a loony, every pearly-yellow tooth showing and then some.

Christ, I thought, how was that thing natural?

The kid shoved a book and a pen roughly into my hands. That face of his just flashing the same smile, wide and terrifying. I was transfixed by the sight of this boy for a while, then looked down at the volume in my hand and realized it to be some kind of novel. I might have said thank you, but there's no way to be certain.

Moments passed and the kid didn't move, and I sure as hell wasn't about to. It all came boiled down to a childish story of "I was here first, damnit."

Then it all dawned on me and I scrawled my name on the novel's inner cover. I handed it back to him cautiously, as if that grin was going to jump right out and swallow me whole. The kid analyzed his book, the smile fading into an utter confusion.

"Raoul Duke?" He asked dumbly.

"Hell yes!" I cried. My blood was torrid; I couldn't take this guff any longer. "That's my name, you swine! Now get out!"

He did, Heaven bless him.

I pulled my hat down over my eyes to try and drown out any and all evidence of this brutish reality. Maybe if I forgot about it all, they'd disappear…

"Mr. Thompson!" Came another voice from my left.

Just from the habit of it, I turned. A woman, bright, attractive and smiling, was making her way over to me. She had mid-length brown hair that flew carelessly in every direction and wore a pin-stripe suit that hugged her figure. I liked her immediately.

"Enjoying the convention?" She asked me.

"Christ no," I answered, more bitterly than I meant. "Who are you?"

She laughed. "Josie Rowe," she said. "I'm a journalist with _the Times_."

"New York?" I inferred.

"Oh God no," she answered seriously. "_The Beverly Wills_ _Times_. They just stole the name. The editor thought it sounded… groovy or something."

"Oh," I muttered.

She went on, "I'd like to get an interview if I could, Mr. Thompson-"

"Duke," I broke in. "My name's Raoul Duke."

There was a tense pause.

"Right-o," said Josie slowly after a moment. "Whatever you want. Duke, huh? So how about that interview, sailor?"

"Sure," I said.

"Great," said Josie.

Why not? I thought. It wasn't as if a few questions were going to kill me. And hell, anything unlike this hellish mayhem had to be worth going for, right? Which brought on the issue…

"But not here," I said. "Too goddamn loud!" I added as an excuse.

Josie didn't even pause to think before she nodded. "Most definitely. Let's go outside. I saw a patio bar or something on the way in."

And so we did. I left that tormenting nightmare to lounge at a bar and be given an interview by a nice-looking girl. Not bad.

Josie had been right about the place, patio and all. No cheap tricks with this lass. The only hitch about the spot were the few conventioneers who had weaseled their way out for a drink, the vermin. There were the "Hendrix afros and drooping mustaches and bell bottoms and love beads" scattered around that made things somewhat typical, but everyone else was a tourist, plain and simple. It was a vile sight. I felt the first great thirst for my case rush over me like a cold shower-

"So," Josie began. She'd already retrieved writing tackle from her handbag including a crude and battered old excuse for a tape recorder, which she set on the counter and hit 'rec.' I went ahead and ordered us two rums.

"Before we really get things out of the hat, I've gotta know," she started casually. "What's with the name?"

"Name?" I echoed.

"Yeah," she said. "_Raoul Duke._ Where'd that come from?"

I shrugged indifference and lit a cigarette. It didn't help. Goddamn thing wasn't even burning the right way.

I began to think dangerously.

_Fade to black._


	2. On The Road

A/N: Bless you for reviewing. Here's more drabble…

* * *

_CUT TO:_

_We're back in THE RED SHARK careening "down the road to Las Vegas" at 90 mph. DUKE is at the wheel proudly wearing a white powdery mustache on his upper lip. ROWE sits on the passenger side clad in a pair of DUKE'S sunglasses and visor hat. THREE DOG NIGHT'S "Mama Told Me (Not to Come)" blares on the radio. Every so often wisps of marijuana smoke stream out from the RED SHARK as they tear up the road, so to speak._

JOSIE (V/O)

I was on an incredible high. The Good Doctor had an awesome stash, it turned out. I find it impossible to recall how Duke and I got from the convention to his car or how he managed to get me loaded, but I quickly found that when you're around a man like Raoul Duke, details like those listed are grossly insignificant. Before I'd even grasped the reality at hand, I found myself floating like a balloon and seeing speckled catfish everywhere. I remember saying something like:

"Whoa! Would you look at my knee? That's got to be the, uh, greatest invention… since… bread… Wait! Uh, Du- du- dukie- Oh my God! _Dukie!_ Where are we going, Dukie?"

"Vegas, goddamnit!" He yelled back.

I laughed hysterically at this and let the whiplash of the corvette drag me back into my seat.

"Hey!" I said, pulling myself against the force of this high-velocity travel once more. "Wasn't I supposed to interview you?"

"By God, you're right!" Duke said. He beat the steering wheel angrily. "Fire away! Quick, man!"

"Shit!" I muttered, glancing around at my feet. The car was swooning. Or was that me? "Where's my tape recorder? I need that thing… to live… Ah fuck it, never mind."

"What!"

"I SAID NEVER MIND!"

And then I found it struggling for stability near the windshield wipers.

"Okay," I said, speaking softly into my tape recorder like a psychotic BINGO announcer. "I'm sitting here with Raoul Duke-"

"Doctor of Journalism!"

"Raoul Duke: Doctor of Journalism. We're driving to Las Vegas in one snazzy, red corvette and I'm high as kite! OW!"

"Ah!" Duke yelled. He suddenly jerked toward me and grabbed my sleeve. "Now you listen, missus, and you listen hard. This well oiled machine here has a name! This isn't just some automotive! It has a _soul_, goddamnit! You're sitting in the Red Shark, woman!"

I laughed again and pulled free from Duke's grasp. He resorted back to mechanically driving in that same, fragile silence.

"Okay man," I said haphazardly. "Whatever floats that quirky boat you drive. Oh! We should get a boat! A _boat!"_

"Never!" He cried passionately.

"Fine… worthless whore," I added. "Now, _why_ are we driving to Las Vegas?"

"I, uh… mystery!" Duke growled in answer.

"Ah, the Good Doctor says it's all a mystery. Better drop the wiffle-ball."

Then, before I had time to change subject and ask Duke where he bought his awe-inspiring Acapulco shirt, the man broke my concentration with a frightening noise. He shrieked like a banish and jumped up from his seat as if he'd sat on a South African tarantula. The Red Shark fishtailed, swerving and spinning and screeching and twirling down the road in a cloud of dust, making me cough like an asthma patient.

"Run away!" I screamed.

But all too late. Before I knew it, the Red Shark had skidded to a stop. A car door slammed, and I opened my eyes. Duke was gone.

"Heeeello?" I offered.

There was the sound of closing trunk, another car door and… was that a school of catfish waving to me from the horizon? I took a long drag from the joint in the ashtray. Medicine, medicine…

My head was steadily rising just a few more feet above the clouds when I glanced back at the driver's seat.

"Sweet Jesus!" I screamed. Duke had somehow reappeared back in the driver's seat and wasn't wearing his hat. "You're bald!" I cried, near tears. "You are one _bald_ man!"

"Am I?" Duke inquired, his hand caressing the top of his head. Then a look of total, terrified clarity covered his face. "Good God, you're not lying!"

"Sweet Jesus, I can't take this." I said in exasperation. "Here, take this-"

I whipped off the visor hat I'd stolen from Duke earlier and placed on the Good Doctor's head in an odd, slanted way so that it hid as much of his bald spot as possible.

Duke barked once in thanks. Meanwhile, his eyebrows seemed to be doing some freak facial hair dance. They were jumping and moving everywhere. It was intensely entertaining.

"What?" He asked. I must have been staring openmouthed at his eyebrows' magnificent talent. "What are you looking at there? Is there… drool, man? No? Maybe? Answer, Rowe! Oh, Christ, never mind. Here-"

He bent over and carefully tore something he held in half. He handed one part to me, thought a moment, and then put the other away.

"What's this here?" I asked.

"Blotter."

"Acid?"

"Oh _yeah_, man."

"Huh."

I placed the thing on my tongue and let it dissolve. My head was already fogged and spinning from the pot, but maybe this crap would stop the catfish from coming back.

"Okay now," Duke started. He was talking fast. Very, very fast. As if there would never be enough time to say what he needed to. "You've got half-an-hour, Greenhorn, maybe less, maybe more, before this vile stuff does its job. DO YOU SAVVY, GREENHORN?"

"Hell yes!" I cried.

The Red Shark roared and we were off again.

_Black screen._


	3. The Arrival

A/N: Thank you, thank you, thank you, Dawnie. You are the best reviewer on You should be paid or something… yup, paid in cookie dough. That would be nice… Ah! I'm wandering, here's chapter three…

* * *

_Roll scene._

_A CLOSE SHOT of ROWE'S face. Sweat is pouring down her forehead… the stolen BUSH HAT is slipping… her eyes are wide and fearful. Her knuckles are white as they grip the check-in counter of a hotel lobby. _

"Duke!" I chirped. "Duke! DUKE!"

There was a sound like a church bell sounding early mass. It took me a long time to realize that the noise was coming from the bell on the counter in front of me. Duke was hitting it mercilessly, completely ignoring me.

"You filthy bastard!" I screamed at him. The tension was snapping me in two. I couldn't stand, couldn't think, couldn't even _ignore_ the blinding pressure in my every being. "You sick, twisted fiend! What have you done to me? I'm dying!"

"Quiet you!" He growled at me, and then turned to the man behind the desk with a big smile. "Don't worry about my assistant. She's been having muscle spasms… gingivitis… among… other things… for days! Weeks!"

"Right," said the man slowly, nodding all the while.

"Uh, yeah. Okay, bucko. We have reservations…"

I was lost after these last few words. Whatever elevator music was playing, whatever the people around me were saying, whatever heart pattern a healthy me would have all of it was in the past. Duke's aviators turned purple and the man's nose swelled and morphed inhumanly. The tacky carpet floor below me slid a few feet to the right. It threw me completely off balance. At the same time, the cold sweat dripping off my hands made me slip. In a moment, I was on the floor, looking up.

Up only to see that the catfish were back from my hours in High-Ville. Only, they weren't the sane, normal, God-given marine animals I'd seen earlier on the road. They were black, leathery, yellow-eyed demons with huge bat-like wings and foot-long whiskers. And each controlled a mouth big enough to swallow a dog in one smiley gulp. The terror I felt was indescribable.

I was trying desperately to scream when a hand pulled me to my feet. I looked wildly around for its owner. Duke's eyes found mine, and I let out a shrill scream of glee. He was human, if not oddly slanted and discolored.

"Come on, Greenhorn," he was saying to me in a strange distorted accent. "Got to get you to the bar before they send us away because of your goddamn whacky antics. Or worse, man, take us to their vault for a beating."

"Beating?" I yelped weakly.

"Hell yes," Duke replied, barely understandable though that thick Turkish accent. "You don't want to know what freak shows they've got in places like these… I've seen frightening things, Greenhorn…"

"You have?" I asked, thinking of the catfish. "Oh my God, get me away from these things. They're everywhere!"

But Duke was only leading me into what must have been their central gathering place. He steered me around their wings, whiskers, tentacles, and God knows what else, right into the heart of their ominous society.

_God help us,_ I thought as we entered a hellish cave filled with shadows and countless crawling beasts.

"What are you doing?" I strained to ask, talking fast to save time. "We'll be killed! They'll swallow us whole like sea bass. SEA BASS!"

"Quiet down, you swine!" Was all I managed to hear from him as answer. All else was lost in the terrible noise these creatures were making.

My God, it was like watching some unholy lovechild spawned from the Discovery Channel and the Twilight Zone. The mutant catfish all seemed to be celebrating together: dancing and looting the bar's booze; flying around the bar stools flinging olives and bar nuts; smoking in the corner; shooting heroin in the shadows; trying to play pool with their wings; having perverted catfish orgies and destroying all viewable hotel furniture all of it accompanied by whooping, growling, roars, laughing, and the strange love calls of these wretched monsters, and strangely, a blaring, echoing rendition of "_Stuck in the Middle with You,"_ by Stealers Wheel.

I might have cried if I thought I was capable of it by that point. But my mind was so twisted so bursting with a kind of deep-sea pressure and nausea—that I'm sure I'd forgotten how.

"BACK!" I screamed, when one of them snarled and tried to grab me. "Back, you colossal demon! I'm not going today! I'm not ready, you hear me? You stay back or I'll kill you!"

The beast let out a roar and reared it's ugly yellow-eyed head, wings beating and massive mouth gulping open and closed. I could see it's gills fluttering in the open air…

I turned around and saw Duke. It was questionably the happiest moment in my life. I seized his shoulders.

"Quick man," I said with passion. "We need fishing gear, a harpoon and a net.! Lots of the fuckers! CAN YOU HEAR ME?"

"Of course I can, you crazy cocksucker!" Duke bellowed back. "Just sit down. They say the room will be ready soon enough. And that the fight is tomorrow. At 7 pm. Got that?"

"That's if we make it out of here alive," I whispered, eyeing the monstrosities all around me. "Holy shit, Doctor! Would you look at that once over there? It's spotted us!"

Duke took a seat on a bar stool and dragged me onto one beside him. Luckily, Duke's arrival seemed to somehow fend off these mutant catfish. At least for the moment. I turned my attention to the Doctor while I had the chance. I tried my best to look at him while he spoke, but the man was becoming increasingly blurry, surrounded by multi-colored smoke and orange polka dots, as well as…

_Sweet Jesus,_ I thought,_ is that a bat? _

It was. One of the wild, flying rats itself was perched atop Duke's bush hat, looking heavily sedated. How it got there didn't seem important.

My eyes –wide and bulging, I'm guessing—found Duke's black ones again.

"DON'T MOVE," I said calmly. "THERE'S A BAT ON YOUR HEAD –BUT DON'T WORRY, DOCTOR, I'LL TAKE CARE OF IT."

"Bat?" Duke repeated, face full of confusion and the beginnings of fear. "What bat? Christ, I hate those things..."

"ON YOUR HEAD," I said in a whisper. "NOW, DOCTOR, DO YOU HAVE A FEW OF THOSE NETS I ASKED FOR?"

"A what-?"

"A NET, GODDAMN IT! A NET!"

The bat fluttered. I cursed myself for the change in volume.

"What? Oh yeah, man, here," Duke said, clearly frightened by the mortal peril he was in. He thrust a flyswatter into my hand. "Holy shit, Greenhorn, you're pretty fucked up. Maybe you'll try mescaline or something next time, eh? Hee hee…"

"HOLD STILL!" I screamed suddenly.

And before Duke had a chance to react, I was beating that bat out of it's life with the flyswatter.

The upside of this act was that I killed the fucker and danced like an Irishman in celebration on St. Patrick's Day.

The downside was that this also seemed to attract those mutant catfish like a steaming pile of crawfish never could. And soon, they were closing in. Whatever treaty Duke had organized seemed to have been thrown to the wind.

And what a terrifying escapade we'd been flung into. One of the catfish swallowed a lounge chair in it's rage, and each and every one of them kept letting out shrill roars of fury. Some took flight and began swooping dangerously close to our heads, while others moved closer to Duke and made to grab him. I bellowed my disapproval and leapt from my chair, only to be thrown back by some unknown force and the carpet crumbled again. A distant moaning could be heard in the distance amongst these terrific colors. I feared for the Doctor's life.

"DOCTOR! They've gotten hold of you! We need those nets pronto! And the harpoons! Good God, will somebody get rid of this smoke! It's blocking my vision! I can't see where the bat it! It could still be moving! SOMEBODY KILL IT…!"

But Duke couldn't hear me anymore, or at least that's what I guessed. I felt dozens of slimy, wet tentacles wrap themselves around my arms and pull me away from my friendly kidnapper. My only chance at survival. Everything was so terribly covered in multi-colored smoke and catfish kept jumping at me from far across the room. I feared the worst, and fought against this terrible massacre with all my physical power.

_Cut to wider shot – ROWE is sitting on the floor, desperately hugging a bar stool and _

_shouting obscene remarks. The room has returned to normality. _

_She's holding a FLY SWATTER, which she's using to hit anyone who comes into swinging range. _

_DUKE is trying not to notice ROWE'S nearly constant shouting. _

_He begins WHISTLING, "_Row, row, row your boat_."_

_Black screen._


	4. Morning, Greenhorn

A/N: Woohoo for Chapter 4! Who thought it could be done! NOBODY! Okay, ahem, time for seriousness. This fic is like a whirlwind without a conscience, so stand back and be ready for the unexpected. Keep in mind, though, that I'll never let it get out of hand. You won't see perverted porn or any sick sex-related stuff in my stories – oh no. That's just not my sense of humor. This here shin-dig is rated for drug-use, violence, and language ONLY. Savvy? Okay then, here's the never before seen Chapter Cuatro. Back to the madness…

* * *

As I remember saying sometime in the not-so-distant past,

"Never lose sight of the primary responsibility. Cover the story. But what was the story? Nobody had bothered to say."

The words echoed in my mind. I opened my eyes and looked drowsily around.

I was in a hotel room, or someplace that had once resembled one in history. Now though, it was different. The place was trashed –and I depict this without exaggeration. Chairs and tables had been over-turned, windows broken, suitcases thrown open and their contents flung, food trays lie in waste, and pounds of cracked watermelon scattered the floor. The walls that weren't sporting holes were smeared with various condiments: mustard to the left, relish to the right, jam behind, cocktail sauce in front, ketchup on the ceiling.

It was hard to imagine how impossibly stoned I'd gotten to actually do all this, especially since my attorney was no longer accompanying my business trips.

I rolled over to see Josie Rowe, small-town newspaper journalist. All was explained. The faint memory of blotter acid and colorful monologues on the imminent danger of killer catfish drifted back through my mind. She was deeply asleep wearing a diving mask, raincoat and fisherman's hat. I squinted suspiciously as the downright awkwardness of her arms and legs.

_She must have passed out there and then_, I concluded with a rough nod.

There was a harsh knock on the door, making me jerk around wildly with surprise.

_Don't these bastards know how to keep the peace?_

I leapt off the bed only to find that my legs wouldn't support me, and dropped like a stone. Whatever monstrous amount of alcohol I'd drunken yesterday had finally swung around to screw me in the head. A terrible, terrible feeling. I managed to stand up after a minute and answer that goddamn door.

It had been a sickly looking kid from the front desk. Apparently, we'd received several calls there during the night. When I asked him why they hadn't been sent up to the room he told me that they tried. Repeatedly. Something about the phone being disconnected. I turned two hairs to the left so I could view the room again out of the corner of my eye. Not a pretty sight. I turned back around and closed the door a further few inches, hoping to God this unhealthy swine hadn't looked in yet.

"So what the fuck do you want?" I said kindly.

In answer, the desk boy stuffed a small sheet of paper into my hand and turned heel before I could say my fond farewells. The pansy.

I slammed the door, eyes on the paper in my hand. It was covered with the tiny, hasty scribbles of a hotel receptionist. I read the note, and reached for my hat.

"Wake up!" I said, slapping Rowe with my bush hat. "Get up, Greenhorn. I won't have you lying in bed on a day like this!"

A few groans and curses later, Rowe was somewhat conscious.

"I hate you," she mumbled sleepily. Then began to remove the array of fishing gear attached to her body.

"Stop your whining," I ordered sharply. "I've just received word from my superiors about our assignment."

"What the hell are you talking about?" Rowe asked. "I thought you were a writer, you dork, not CIA."

"Shut your trap, swine!" I said, and slapped her with my hat again just to be sure. "I'll explain, Greenhorn, don't you worry about that. But not now, not here. Breakfast!"

And with that, we ducked out of the room, bringing only the typewriter and the case. Rowe hung the "do not disturb" sign on just for good measure. In the now and then, I had a thirst for a mango sprizter like a Yankee on crack who was down in the ninth inning.

_Now where's the bar…_


	5. Breakfast of Champions

A/N: Here's another quick chapter for Hate and Mayhem. Oh, and I'm glad you like the nickname, Dawnie. I wanted Josie to be given a nickname like everyone else in the Thompson world. And Greenhorn was the only one that felt right to me. There you have it.

"Welcome to the Riviera Bar and Restaurant!" said the cheery woman behind the podium. "Smoking or none?"

We stood in the entrance lobby of the restaurant, surrounded by sunburned strangers in colorful bucket hats.

The hostess's blue shaded eyes bore into my head, which felt like it had been shot. Repeatedly.

Thankfully though, it didn't look like I was going to be the one doing the talking.

A husky voice to my right said, "What do you think, woman?" and 'accidentally' spat cigarette ashes in her general direction. I noted that Duke was not a morning person. "Uh… and we need a big table… with, uh, room for… eight people, at least!"

My heart swelled with pride at the look on our hostess's face. I can't fully explain it, but somewhere between that first step into the Red Shark and last night's major memory blockage, I found my loathing for my kidnapper somehow drifting away. You see, over the past day or so my gripping fear and awkwardness toward Raoul Duke had been forgotten, and now I saw him more as a deviant playmate. My position had gone from panicked victim of kidnapping, to hazy victim of compelled drug use, to almost …comfortable. The feeling seems strange even now, but it's there.

The hostess took a few moments to wipe the searing embers from her face and hair. Then we were led to a huge, circular table by a bay window. We dropped the case and typewriter with a massive clatter and sat down, taking up three chairs each.

The waiter came and went, then arrived back again bearing all that we'd ordered. That list included only the vitals, mind you; things like orange juice, rum, mandarins, multicolored spritzers, Singapore Slings, malt liquor, tangerines, Brazilian jumbos, and bowls of orange pulp.

"Vitamin C," Duke would say knowledgably. "Can never get enough, Greenhorn. Remember that."

Then he asked for the hotel Gazette and was soon hidden behind great sheets of newspaper. I doubt he was actually reading anything, by who's to judge in these situations?

Thinking of which, my mind was beginning to clear. Threads of memory came back to me. Memories that roused hundreds (if not dozens) of reasonable questions in my mind. Rational thought was at last taking the wheel.

I began to wonder why the hell I'd let this joyride go so far; if there was a missing person notice out for me; just how Duke had gotten this hotel room; what his plan of action was; and –just how the hell he was going to pay for all the shit we'd ordered last night. The latter of which seemed pretty important at our present juncture.

Desperate for answers now, I tossed a hefty orange at Duke's newspaper. An action soon followed by a yelp of pain from the Doctor. It got his attention, anyhow.

"Howdy," I said sweetly. Duke massaged his forehead, and muttered some fowl insult under his breath. "Do you mind telling me just what's going on here, _Duke?_"

As I expected, I didn't get a straight answer out of him. But after a few more minutes' poking, prodding and threatening the Good Doctor into the right directions, I got the info I needed. And, as things folded out, I wasn't in such a bad state of affairs after all.

Turns out that Duke was at the Beverly Wills convention as a side-job, to promote his book as it hit the market. He said he'd been cocksuckered into the whole thing by his literary agent, and bitterly said that he planned to murder her this coming Fall. Anyway that night, Duke had had an appointment with a young journalist his superiors thought had 'special potential.' The cracker was being set up as his apprentice, as Duke put it; wanting to steal his secrets and sell them to baseball-loving pansies, says the Doctor. Translation: Duke got stuck as mentor to a snooty, bright-eyed, I've-got-talent, rookie journalist trying to learn the ropes from a master. But Duke wasn't going to take that guff; not from those swine. He'd been trying to think of a way out, an escape. And he was about ready for hell when I came to talk to him, and his gleam of hope was rekindled. So, instead of taking the 'special potential' as his apprentice to Las Vegas, he took me. Of course, he figured that I wouldn't see his logic back at the convention, so a little _influencing_ came standard: argo, spiking everything I touched.

It was then that I asked him what we were doing in Vegas anyway. And in answer, received a handful of orange pulp hurled at me, flying right by me cheek.

_Wrong question,_ I thought, but asked again anyway. He didn't miss the second time.

But by the fifth throw of pulp, I understood. Duke had told me the whole story yesterday, but I'd been too stoned to remember.

"You gave me that stuff!" I cried. "You treacherous bastard!"

"Why you lowly sh—"

Our mild-mannered conversation was rudely interrupted by a soft voice clearing its throat.

Duke looked up first, his arm still stretched back in the wind-up of his pitch. By our table, stood a thin woman with short blond hair and a massive red bowtie reminiscent of 'Minney Mouse' perched atop her head.

"Excuse me," she said flatly. "But we've had some complaints from the other guests. If you could keep the noise level down, that would be great."

_Long, bewildered pause._

I stared at her fearfully for a moment, then turned to Duke for instructions. I assumed that the typewriter would knock her out cold if thrown hard enough and that we could drag her away before the waiters knew what was happening. It was a surefire plan. All we'd need…

But Duke had already made to hide the orange in his shirt and had sunk inconspicuously into his chair. "Right-o… uh-huh… yeah, will do. Mm-hm, okay. Bye."

The woman nodded, smiled and left. I was in shock.

"We should've done something," I said, disappointedly.

Duke threw a small glass of orange juice at my head. I ducked just in time. "And bring the cops down on us? No, no, I'd rather die fighting…" he tenderly patted his case, while his eyes darted every which direction with suspicion of onlookers.

"Right," I said with a nod, and leaned forward. "Now what were you saying about the assignment?"

Duke blinked. His cigarette holder drooped as he frowned, deep in thought. "Oh!" He said after a moment. "Oh _yeah,_ man, the story."

He went on to explain that we were to report to the Las Vegas Sports Center to cover a boxing match at seven o'clock tonight, and that we'd set up the technicalities from there.

I leaned back, satisfied with what I knew. Until one more question struck me.

"You never said how we're paying for all this stuff," I said, gesturing the table. "And the _room._"

It was hard to remember it and not shutter.

"Hm," said Duke thoughtfully, sipping his Singapore Sling. "Good question, Greenhorn, a damn good question…"

And with that, Duke stood up picked up our belongings (and the drinks) and we left the restaurant.

I had a bad feeling about what was happening. The way Duke walked cautiously towards the elevator and stood rigidly, even more paranoid than before, were not good signs. I could only hope the management hadn't spotted us yet, and that we could slip in and out of our room before they realized what was going on.

But that wasn't what happened at all.


	6. The Explosion Scene

A/N: Hello! I've been up all night writing this chapter; making it perfect, you know the drill. Sorry it took so long to get out, but nothing seemed worth writing until now. I hope you can relate to a writer's peril. Warning: This chapter has it's fair share of profanity, so don't say I didn't warn you. It's not all sunshine and rainbows, you see. Eh? Oh yeah, and please review if you've got something to say. Just- no flames. I've had my bad experiences. Oh, and this own's got two different perspectives too. Rowe first, Duke second. Blah, blah, blah. Here's the story...

* * *

"Careful, Greenhorn," my instructor warned. "These broadband hotel commuters are a fowl mistress." 

Duke had uttered these cautious words as we waited for the elevator and prayed saints it was an empty transport. In our hands, we held everything we could carry including the leftover watermelon, various unmanhandled condiment packages, and of course, the small containers of high explosives I had yet to mention in this retelling.

Suddenly, there was a deafening sound like a 'ding!' that sent my mentor and I flying backwards towards our room in terror, yelping and ricocheting off the walls as we did. We didn't realize it'd been the elevator itself, but there was really no time to worry about that kind of thing anyway.

On the second abandonment of our kind hostel, I popped the notion of disguises, regretting my words immediately. I had no idea at the time of the implications of this sorry decision; neither of how it would affect Duke, nor of how fucking long this antic would set us back in our escape. Christ, I half expected the Feds to be waiting for us in the hallway when we came back out of our room.

But, I was sorely mistaken. For! When the good Doctor and I emerged from our place of mayhem decked out in a hybrid breed of cowboy, Indian, burglar, firefighter, cop, angel, and ballerina costumes (_may I note now that I, Josie Rowe mundane journalist, was **not**_ _wearing the too-too), _the hallway was as clear as a day in Hawaii.

The lobby, in conflict, was a full-flung gale. A baker's dozen worth of Las Vegas law enforcement agents were scattered about the place, all looking like rabid dogs hungry for human flesh. Little did I know at the time that the police had gathered only for their annual raffle, and that life was just cruel in that manner. But as I said, I couldn't piece this together at the time.

"No," I whimpered to my associate, and clung to his too-too. "Do you realize what we're up against? We'll be mauled!"

Duke seemed shocked and hurt for a long moment before saying, "You were digging around in the case! You rat bastard!"

"No! I haven't!"

_Granted, I **had**..._

But our gentle conversation was interrupted. Something had brought the hoard of policemen to our attention, and if our wild yelling hadn't, the disguises sure as hell did.

Before I knew it, my plastic tomahawk and mini-halo had fallen dramatically to the floor, and my wrists were cuffed painfully behind me. Worse still, a cop had been talking to me and I'd missed the first part. And worst of all, not six feet away, the good Doctor was being arrested in the same way… while another cop held the typewriter and _case_.

I sobered up in an instant, for an instant. Twenty years of memories-to-be flashed before my eyes; memories of bars, untrustworthy criminals all locked up together in a concrete box.

Sadly, though, I realized after that moment that I was a real chickenshit around a dozen armed cops (_who still looked an awful lot like rabid canine beasts_), and that Duke was weak with substance abuse. He was probably too frail to help us out of this mess. And a mess it was

We were in a tight spot, to say the least, and it didn't look like that great boxing match would ever see us in its ranks.

_15 minutes later_

I looked sideways at my apprentice. The woman didn't look good, that's for goddamn sure. … 'Terrified' and 'stricken with nausea' was the way to put it. But I knew for a fact that this girl was a blessed American and was one of the few with true grit. I could only hope that she had a hard stomach for what was about to happen next.

_Any minute now,_ I said to myself.

The two fucking bastards sitting in the front seats looked about ready to kill us right there and then, as if we'd been raving and jabbering like goddamn animals this whole time. I could only imagine what horrors these cops would inflict on us if we got where we were headed.

_If only,_ I thought, _we could break through this fence-like barrier… then Rowe would take the driver by the throat while I go to work on this fat pansy…_

And then it happened. A massive and terrific 'boom' could be heard, then a scream, and a great impact force that could only be a collision.

I opened my eyes to check the damage.

_Well_, I thought, _that fucking fence is gone._

The scrap had been blown clear off its hinges from the blast, but that wasn't the half of it. The front of the car had been ripped open, the crushed hood billowed black steam and the window shield was completely opaque with chinks. I looked down…

I murmured disbelief. The cuffs were perfectly snapped in two and I didn't have a scrap on me. It was a fucking miracle. "Sweet fucking Jesus!" I yelped and kicked my flimsy door open and jumped from my seat. "It worked! Jesus Christ!"

It was then that it occurred to me to check on the girl. I ducked my head back under the hood to find her still sitting there, completely petrified.

"Greenhorn?"

A voice inside my head said to leave her. That she was a rat bastard anyway, and a useless apprentice, never to amount to anything like all the other cocksuckers I could've taken in.

_But no. We've come this far_. I thought.

I didn't drive all this fucking way for her to stroke out on me now. Gas mileage couldn't be made up! And goddamn it, I liked her.

"Greenhorn!" I said again. No movement. I noticed a pool of blood on her forehead, but her eyes were still wide open in terror. "GREENHORN!" I shouted. "GET OUT! THE WEASELS ARE CLOSING IN! I CAN SMELL THE UGLY BRUTES! FLEE!"

She turned and looked at me with sorry eyes after that. I groaned and pulled her out myself.

Then came the matter of the _case_, which I hoped to God the mindless lizards hadn't gotten their sweaty hands on yet.

We found it under the feet of one of our escorts. I used the hacksaw to cut Rowe free, and then gave her a band-aid and a bag of grass to wipe that fucking gawk off her face. After a few minutes of sitting on the curb under a cloud, my head cleared up enough for us to get the hell out of there. It was a surprise the cops hadn't already found this massacre. But hell, they were probably all still back at the Flamingo getting drunk enough to care.

We were five blocks from the scene when Rowe spoke up for the first time.

"Why didn't you _tell me_ about the fucking _C-4?_" She asked.

"What? Uh... oh yeah… uh… I didn't?"

"No, you shithead! We could've died! Those cops are probably dead! Those canine bastards are after us now!" She screamed.

"Huh?" I said. "Fuck, Greenhorn! You've got all sideways, man!"

"What? Don't be a prick, Duke."

"Now listen here, goddamn it. You don't have to go and castrate me like that—"

Rowe stopped walking beside a drain pipe and glowered hate at me. The white bandage around her head was stained with blood, but she didn't seem to care.

"Sweet Jesus," I said quietly. "You look _pissed_, man." I took a long drag and blew.

"You crazy Nazi…" she said.

And then, before I had a real hold on things, she was coming at me! Jesus no! Why should I die by the hand of this flap-crazy loon? Is this really how it ends! But... I was mistaken. Instead, she rushed past me,grabbed the case and had it open on the floor and dug through it like some kind of wild animal.

"Uh… hey!" I yelled after I'd recovered from my near death experience, and jumped to the floor to stop her.

But it was too late. By the time I'd shoved her away from my precious treasures, she'd already thrown the whole shaker of cocaine down the sewer drain. Beautiful, snow white cocaine, all gone. A powdery white national treasure, down the gutter like last night's spaghetti. I felt a tear in my eye as a looked down into that endless abyss, wondering if the shaker could have survived the fall. Doubtful. Shit.

"_You!"_ I snarled and turned back to Rowe. I had blood-spattered murder on my mind. I'd strangle her, call the bats, rip her head off and leave her in an alley…

She was hovering over the case again like some filthy coyote. I tried to sneak around her arm to reach the hacksaw…

"Woah," I heard her murmur as I lied in wait for the moment of action. I looked up.

"Mother of God," I whispered.

_She's found it all!_ A voice screamed in my skull.

From the looks of the debris on the ground, she'd eaten two mescaline and some laughers and was now washing it all down with a beer.

"Sweet Jesus!" I screamed. "What the fuck are you doing? You're going to die, you beast!"

As only a good citizen would do, she ignored me, wiped her nose, and handed me the closed case. "Here," she said. "All right, let's get there before this stuff takes hold, as it were. Tell me what the fuck we're doing again?"

I was speechless, but cracked open a laugher anyway so she wouldn't get lonely on the trip.


	7. Seven

Hi there. Kill me later. Let's just say I uh, went on one of those Indian 3-day, 3-night trip into the woods to find myself. Yeah... that sounds good. I'll do better from now on. Honest. : )

* * *

"Seven"

It was nearing 4 o'clock in the evening. Detective Tod Brennan and his sidekick, Charlie, occupied the last office at the end of the hallway in the Las Vegas Police Station. Charlie bore a hole in the ground with his eyes while Brennan paced the room, footstep after footstep, channeling every fiber in his being into the case at hand. Concentration possessed him. He ran the facts once more through his mind, going over every last detail, looking for clues to catch his man.

_Two officers, dead. Two suspects at large. One department vehicle, wrecked, by a high-explosive with a homemade timer. Two arrests were made prior to the incident: one man, one woman. Twenty witnesses to apparent acts of vile disturbance of peace, et cetera, et cetera. …And now they were on the lamb, _Brennan thought grimly, grinding a toothpick to the stub.

Brennan's eyes fell on his loyal sidekick. "We'll get 'em, boss," Charlie said firmly from his rigid seat on the edge of a desk. "We always do."

"I know, Charlie," said Brennan, a man of steel and justice. "I know."

* * *

Meanwhile, not twenty miles west, a well-known journalist and his partner in chaos moved stealthily through the streets of Vegas, high on what have you and having the time of their lives.

"Yowee!" Duke squealed. He leaned gratefully on a wall to support himself while he laughed all hysterics.

"Hey," said Josie, stumbling over to meet him. "Hey Duke. The sun's going down."

He looked up. "By God, it is. What time is it, Greenhorn? Quick!"

Josie's wandering eyes found her watch and she smiled. "Six something. It's too dark to read."

(This, of course, was some ill-effect of substance abuse, for Vegas had never been brighter. The millions of white-bright light bulb sparkled from above their heads and stretched down in beautiful, straight chutes toward the horizon and beyond. Then again, the psychedelic light chapter of their drug frenzy had perhaps simply not arrived yet.)

"Jesus Christ, is daylight savings time _still around?_," Duke exclaimed, not knowing what we know, and sent his arms swinging in all directions. He slid to the ground, then lapsed into a serious moment, before bursting into a giggle fit once again. He shook his head. "NO! We need to get to the stadium, Greenhorn! There's not much time left! Our very _existence _depends on this, goddamnit."

"Right."

"Double Time! Knees high!"

Duke fell forwards, stumbling a little faster than he had been. Josie followed obediently, marching forwards like a Hitler recruit. But the Sports Center was still a good five miles away, and the pair would soon find themselves distracted in the great maze sin city. And here was it came now in one great wave of confusion: a white Cadillac had just rolled to a halt by the curb, the window came down, and a head appeared. It was a great round-faced man with a lumberjack beard and wino spots dotting his nose.

"Need a ride?" He asked in a great thundering voice.

"Uh…" Duke said. Josie shoved him, seeing the opportunity if he didn't, and like that they were riding in the back seat of a fine leather-seated automobile with a fellow called Keith and his great booming voice. He wasn't a bad guy, just a friendly alcoholic that enjoyed talking to anybody and everybody—strangers especially. A new challenge, I suppose is how he saw.

Anyway, good jolly Keith told them a story about how he wrestling a bear up in Ely, Minnesota, that had apparently escaped from this traveling circus, and how that circus' chief clown gave him his father's prized possession in return. He never told them what it was. After his story, he kindly dropped them off at the corner of where Duke had asked. Unfortunately for the pair of misfits, they would never remember Keith or his kindness, only an ominous vision of a half clown, half-bear that haunted the mountains in Ely. And unfortunately for their mission, Duke had by this time forgotten their task and had instead directed to a restaurant that he remembered had good meatloaf. Josie was too interested in her thumb to care.

"This is delicious," Josie commented.

She and Duke sat at the finest table Duke's memorable restaurant had to offer, and ravished their meatloaf in seconds. They paid with napkins they'd stolen at the entrance, and slipped out the back. The perfect crime …had they not been seen and reported by the dishwasher, Benny.

Speaking of benny, Duke had decided at a whim to buy four tubes of Benzedrine from an old friend two blocks from the restaurant. He had insisted that he and his apprentice needed as much energy as possible for the task at hand, which he soon after remembered and they were on the sly lamb once again, headed toward the Sports Center at top speed. About a half-mile further down the line, Josie realized that one of her shoes was gone. This was a bad sign, Duke realized. He knew better than to leave a shoe behind; it was a clear give away of their position! So the pair had to double back and find it.

Josie checked her watch again. It was a quarter to seven. She told Duke, who panicked. They wrestled the flip-flop of the nearest tourist and sprinted. Time was running out; the laughers, and mescaline, and tea had worn off. All that was left was the energy-rush of the benny tubes, meatloaf and all the rest. There was work to be done! The Sports Center lay before them, surely, just beyond the Riviera and the great talking palm tree. If only they could make it there on time, infiltrate the stadium and manage to take enough notes to cover an 18,000 word article for Sports Illustrated… then, things might just fold out. It seemed easy enough.

They had reached their kingdom of heaven.

* * *

"Detective Brennan? I've got some new leads."

Tracy Jasper's voice crushed Tod Brennan's train of thought. His eyes whipped around to his office door, where Tracy's head peeked out from behind the blinded window. It had been a long day.

"What have you got?" He asked. His forehead showed a great crease from years of serious police work.

"There have been a lot of calls about domestic disturbances, loitering, and property destruction along about Hampton Avenue."

"That's not so unusual, Tracy. Where's the beef?"

"Pretty unusual if three out of five callers stated they saw a woman in a suit and weird man –both Caucasian."

Brennan raised his eyebrows.

"That's not it, Detective. We _just_ got another sighting from a guy down at Malone's Steakhouse. We got lucky on this one; he said the pair slipped out without paying."

Brennan was amazed. He looked at his co-worker like he'd found his Juliet. "Tracy, that's our man. We've got 'em." He punched his palm in excitement.

Tracy blushed, and smiled. "Do you want me to dispatch somebody? I think Allen is near Hampton—"

Brennan shook his head. "No, no, no. These are mine. Go get Charlie and tell him what you told me. We're heading out pronto."

Tracy nodded, pulled her head out of view, and closed the door with a thud.

Brennan looked around his office. The window behind his desk was open to let in the night's cool breeze; the lights outside made it seem like dawn all over again. Of all the places to work, he had to choose the one where sleep came uneasy. The detective ruffled his hair before standing up and reaching for his coat and gun. It was time for a rundown.


End file.
